Chương 26: The Imperial Bloodline (2)

Teren leaned toward the carriage window as they approached. The broad research hall stood behind its low stone wall exactly as he remembered. Smaller wooden buildings surrounded the paved courtyard, and two guards waited at the outer gate. Along one side of the main hall, close to ground level, a narrow window sat high in the basement wall. The skylight. Seeing it brought back the last few moments before the explosion. For a moment, Teren considered whether it could still give him a way out.

He could go through with the lineage test to get full trust from the old mage, then avoid the main doorway afterward, and leave through that window instead. Then he remembered the red circle closing across the threshold. He knew the trap had exploded when they tried to leave, but he did not know whether leaving was the only thing that could trigger it.

For all he knew, the trap might recognize his Corvadryn blood the moment he crossed into the basement, and then wait until someone crossed the threshold again before exploding. Or the lineage resonator might activate traps around more than one exit. Anyone willing to hide a magical trap for so long could have put another one around the skylight just as easily. He had already died once in that basement. There was no reason to enter it again merely because he could imagine one possible escape.

The carriage entered the compound. Edras led him into the main research hall while the escorting guards remained outside. His three assistants looked up from their work when they entered: two men in work coats and a young woman with an ink stain across one thumb. Edras dismissed all three from the building. The younger man hesitated.

"Master, we're in the middle of calibrating—""It can wait. Take your notes and continue elsewhere until I call you back." The assistant stopped arguing. Within a few minutes, Teren and Edras were alone inside the hall. Edras locked the outer door and placed wards across the windows and doors before bringing Teren into the smaller testing room at the back. The next examinations went much as Teren remembered. Edras repeated the safer tests he had used in the previous loop.

Teren followed the instructions carefully and never pushed more mana than Edras asked for. Each produced the same result: a clear purple response that had no place in an ordinary mana reading. By the time the final instrument went dark, the old mage no longer looked uncertain.

"Are we done?" Teren asked, hoping they wouldn't have to enter the basement.

"Not quite." Edras crossed the room toward the heavy iron door built into the rear wall.

"I have one last test I need to do. The device in my basement was built specifically to test for Corvadryn lineage. I've never seen it give a positive result, but the old records are clear about what it should produce for someone of that bloodline." His fingertips began to glow blue as he reached toward the markings around the doorframe, and told Teren to follow him. Teren stopped moving after only a few steps. The basement. The iron door. The threshold. He had reached the point he had been waiting for.

"Wait!" Edras looked back. Teren stared at the door. His first instinct was to tell the truth: there was a trap below, using the device would activate it, and they would die when they tried to leave. But there was no way he could know any of that. To Edras, Teren had never been inside this building before today. Teren wasn't even supposed to know what waited at the bottom of those stairs. He took one slow step backward.

"Something about that door feels wrong." Edras's hand lowered from the frame.

"What do you mean?"

"I... don't know." That part sounded weak even to Teren. Edras stared at him. Teren tried again.

"When you said another testing device was waiting downstairs, I didn't think much of it. But the closer I get to this door..." He rubbed one palm against the side of his tunic.

"I really don't think I should go through it." Edras's eyes narrowed slightly.

"Did you feel anything similar during the other tests?"

"Not like this. It only started when I walked toward the basement." Teren needed the lie to sound convincing enough that the mage would accept it without forcing him through the doorway.

"And it's getting stronger now?" Edras asked. Teren nodded.

"Yes. The closer we get to that door, the worse it feels." This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Edras studied him for a moment.

"Then tell me what you're actually feeling." Teren looked at the iron door. He did not have a supernatural sense for traps. All he had was a memory of a red runic circle and an explosion powerful enough to kill him before he understood what had happened. But he could not tell that to the mage.

"It feels... dangerous," Teren said.

"Not the room we're standing in. Just that doorway. And whatever device you were going to use down there." Edras remained quiet for a few seconds.

"Dangerous how?"

"I'm not sure. All I know is that if I go through that door, I'll die." Teren hated how vague he needed to sound, but becoming too specific could create problems for him later. He stepped a little closer to the iron door, enough to make the old memory tighten his stomach again.

"It gets worse when I think about going down there and using that device. Like something is... waiting for that to happen. Like... there is a trap on that door." Edras looked from Teren to the door.

"I have been using this compound for decades. There cannot be any traps here except the ones I placed myself to protect it."

"But there is!"

"You cannot know that." Teren caught himself.

"I mean... I understand. It's your research hall, but I know I'm right about this." Edras studied him more closely. Teren forced himself to continue before the mistake became more important than the warning.

"I know how this sounds. Maybe it is only some strange reaction from whatever this bloodline is. But you just told me that my mana belongs to a dynasty that was supposed to be extinct. All I want is for you to check everything first. If I'm wrong, we only lose a little time. If I'm right..." He let the sentence end there. Edras looked at the iron door again.

"What do you think will happen if I cross it?"

"I don't know..." Edras's expression tightened.

"I've been using that basement for years." Teren looked at the door and remembered the skylight outside. He could suggest that. Maybe they could enter and use another exit afterward to escape. No. That depended on too many things he did not know. The trap might react to him entering. It might react to the resonator. The skylight might have another trap. There might be something else hidden inside the basement that he had never noticed because he had died before he had the chance.

The only safe choice was not to enter.

"I refuse to go into that basement," Teren said finally.

"Not until you have checked what's waiting around that doorway." Edras did not immediately argue.

"If I had only these readings," the mage said after a while, "I would still refuse to reach a definite conclusion until I used the device downstairs." He looked at one of the simpler testing instruments on the table.

"But I saw the purple flame myself. No one outside the Corvadryn line has ever produced it. At this point, there is no real doubt that you are descended from them. Perhaps... we might not need to use the lineage resonator anymore." Teren let himself relax slightly. The mage walked back to the main room and removed the wards from the outer door.

"Stay here." Teren followed him anyway.

"Where are you going?"

"To get everyone away from the hall. If you're right, I'm not going to test this with people standing close enough to be killed." That was good enough for Teren. Edras opened the door and called his assistants and guards back only long enough to give them new orders. The assistants had been waiting near the front path with the guards.

"Clear the compound," Edras said.

"Every building. Move everyone beyond the compound wall." The young woman stared at him.

"Master Edras?"

"Do it now." One of the guards stepped forward.

"Is there a threat inside the research hall?"

"Possibly. I do not know the nature of it yet, but if there is a danger, it is magical. There is nothing you can do inside the hall that would help. Just make sure no one remains anywhere inside the compound." That answer moved them faster than a reassurance would have. Edras sent two guards to the smaller residences and workshops inside the compound. Another was ordered across the wall to warn the nearest neighboring houses. The assistants joined the servants, maids and workers moving toward the gate.

Once the guards had confirmed that everyone else was outside the compound, Teren and Edras followed them through the outer gate. They walked outside the compound and stopped on the other side of the cobblestone road, where the evacuated residents and staff had gathered. The servants and maids whispered among themselves. Guards watched the research hall, ready to fight against anything. One of the assistants kept looking toward Edras as if waiting for permission to ask what was happening.

The old mage finally seemed satisfied with the distance. He walked to the edge of the road where loose stone and gravel had collected beside a drainage channel. He crouched and pressed one hand against the ground. Teren watched small stones twitch around his fingers. Then they moved. Pebbles, broken pieces of stone, and larger chunks slid across the dirt toward Edras's hand. They rose from the ground and began fitting themselves together. Teren stepped back in surprise.

Within seconds, a squat humanoid figure stood beside the mage. It was only about four feet tall, assembled from uneven pieces of gray stone. Its arms were thick, its legs short, and its rounded head had no face at all.

"What the hell is that?"

"A golem." Teren looked at the featureless stone head.

"Is it... is it alive?"

"No. It can carry out simple commands, but it has no mind of its own. I'll send it to the basement first." Edras placed his palm against the golem's shoulder. A faint blue glow passed from his hand into the stone and disappeared through thin lines between the fitted pieces. Teren looked back at the distant research hall.

"We're standing outside the entire compound. How are you even going to know what it's doing once it goes inside?"

"I can connect part of my awareness to its senses."

"Whoa... You can see through it?" Teren exclaimed. So this was the power of an archmage.

"Not quite the way you see through your own eyes, but close enough for what I need." Teren looked at the golem again.

"If that trap really does explode and destroys it, what happens to you while you're connected?" Edras glanced at him with what might have been exasperation, though it was always difficult to tell with the usually impassive mage.

"Teren, I was an archmage before you were born. I know how much of a connection I can safely maintain." He returned his attention to the golem.

"If the golem is destroyed, I will sever the link before the damage can pass through it." Teren nodded. Maybe he should just keep his mouth shut now. The archmage obviously knew what he was doing. Edras stepped away from the construct. The golem turned toward the research compound and started walking. Its movements were heavy but surprisingly steady. It crossed the road, passed through the open gate, and continued toward the main hall. Teren could see it clearly at first.

Then the golem entered the main building and went out of sight.